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My cohort in the Miami MFA was a bit older and more diverse than others. We had among us a Barbadian schoolteacher, a South African whose ancestor was head of the Voortrekkers and was killed by Zulus, two women from local Cuban families, and a California poet who rode his K-Mart bicycle in heavy Miami traffic—knees up around his ears, ponytail streaming in the wind—and stopped to nibble hallucinogenic flowers from people’s shrubs.

A student pouted at me in conference today and said she doesn’t care about writing or reading well. She wants a good grade, and to finish her biology degree, and to get a high-paying job in quality control at her favorite meatpacking plant.

Multiply 15 minutes of fame by 6 billion people, and you’re bound to run across someone famous sometime. Some encounters are more notable than others.There was that night in Santa Monica, when the girl I was with asked a familiar-looking man at a café table if we’d seen his work, and he said haughtily, “I’ve been in many, many things.” Later that night we remembered he did supermarket commercials in the style of the more famous Mr. Whipple. Later still, the girl borrowed the keys to my truck to get her jacket and stole all my things.

Your entries to the “One True Sentence” contest prove you’ve seen and heard some things. No wonder you have that mad gleam in your eyes.It was difficult for Mrs. Churm, but with two sons of her own, she chose, “I’ve seen both of my brother’s crying at the same woman’s kiss that left marks on them that looked like welts, but was only lipstick.” So Noah wins. Noah wins.

The "One True Sentence" contest will remain open another day. Give it a try! See the two previous posts for details.Until then, here's an essay I wrote for the current issue of Adjunct Advocate: " On Babies ." (It probably isn't what you think.)

In the last post, I wrote about Ernest Hemingway’s “Paris 1922” writing exercise, which helped him find his mature style. “All you have to do is write one true sentence,” he said. “Write the truest sentence that you know.”